Research on the effects of exchange programmes has a long tradition (see overview in Pettigrew, 2004, p. 770). In general, there is much more empirical data with regard to the effects on personal development than with regard to professional aspects (Thomas, Kammhuber, Chang & Ehret, 2001, p. 9). Focussing on the effects on personal development, an overview of the specific literature stresses the fact that the highest values in terms of outcomes are found in the area of cultural enhancement, personality development and foreign language proficiency (Kehm, 2005, p. 21; Maiworm, Steube & Teichler, 1993, p. 110). Focussing on professional aspects of future teachers, hardly any evidence addresses the question of how international mobility contributes to the development of teaching-specific competences. The few available studies suggest that the participation in an international student mobility programme contributes to increased self-efficacy beliefs for teaching (Pence & Macgillivray, 2008), to more appreciation for cultural diversity in classrooms (Kambutu & Nganga, 2008; Rapoport, 2008), to an increased confidence for teaching children of cultural minorities (Chieffo & Griffiths, 2004; Wiggins, Follo & Eberly, 2007) and to a conceptual change toward a more global perspective in teaching (Willard-Holt, 2001). However, the existing findings regarding these teaching-specific effects arise solely from retrospective self-report data and from anecdotic evidence. It has to be assumed, therefore, that these findings contain a considerable hindsight bias. Against this background, an experimental study with a pre- and post-test-design focussing on teacher-specific effects of international student mobility programmes promises innovative results. Hence, the present paper investigates how teaching-specific competences develop during the participation in an international student mobility programme and compares these development patterns with those of students studying at their home university.

In order to analyze the teaching-specific competences, respective learning fields were defined by analysing the sparse empirical literature and the experiences of former exchange-students. The existing literature suggests focusing on different dimensions of teaching-specific self-efficacy beliefs, on the appreciation of cultural diversity in classroom and on the awareness of global dimensions in teaching. The latter facet was conceived as the awareness of one‘s own normality conceptions and a respective “competence model of normality reflection” was generated. On this basis, standardized instruments were developed and pre-tested to assess teaching-specific self-efficacy beliefs, appreciation of cultural diversity in classroom and the awareness of one‘s own normality conceptions. These instruments were applied in an experimental group (n = ca 150) and a comparable control group (n = ca 150) before and after the participation in an international mobility programme (respectively before and after an analogue time interval for the control group).

At the conference in September, the results of the longitudinal analyses will be presented. These results will show to what extent the participation in an international student mobility programme may contribute to develop teaching-specific competences.